


bloom again

by mintea



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: All of the members make an appearance, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Botany, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-04
Updated: 2017-08-04
Packaged: 2018-12-11 00:57:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11703447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mintea/pseuds/mintea
Summary: Long after the end of the world, life starts anew.ORMonsta X are postapocalyptic botanists.





	bloom again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [florisuga](https://archiveofourown.org/users/florisuga/gifts).



> For Willow, who deserves the moon and stars. I'm still working out the logistics of how to get those for you, so I hope this will do in the meantime.

Kihyun pulls his rover up behind the other vehicles parked along the crumbling curb outside the research center. Once the vehicle has fully powered down he hops out and slams the door. He saunters around to the other side of the vehicle and pops open the power pack compartment behind the rear door. As he removes the power pack he starts to whistle—an aimless tune that rises sharply in pitch when the pack requires an extra yank to pull free.

The pack hits the ground with a thud. Kihyun leaves it there and opens the front passenger door. The satchel he picks up off the seat gets treated with much more care. He places the strap crosswise across his chest to keep it from sliding off, then secures the bag with one hand before hefting the power pack with the other. 

He has to squint against the glare from the solar panels that cover the outer surface of the building as he half-carries-half-drags the power pack toward the entrance. The power pack scrapes across the cracked bricks. It adds a lower harmony Kihyun’s tune; but the song soon falls into silence when Kihyun has to struggle to hoist the power pack into an empty charging port to the right of the front door. He waits for the red light to switch to yellow, indicating that the charging process has begun, before making his way inside the building. 

The second he steps through the doors, Kihyun feels a weight lift from his chest. The air outside has been safe to breathe for close to twenty years now, but the air inside still feels somehow crisper, more clear. Kihyun has no doubt that this is in part thanks to the giant ginkgo tree that rises from the center of the entrance atrium. The tree twines through the derelict escalators that cut across the otherwise open area and stops just short of the skylight six stories above.

Kihyun makes sure to stray close to the tree on his way to the elevators, trailing one hand across the rough bark. The tree is easily his favorite thing about this place. It was planted when people first reclaimed this building half a century ago, and is now the very heart of the operation running here. People may come and go, but the tree always remains. It’s an anchor for Kihyun. The roots that sink below and the leaves stretching above have helped him stay stationary in this place for longer than he’s stayed anywhere before.

Kihyun would happily linger and settle down on the grassy area surrounding the tree. It wouldn’t be the first time. He’s spent enough time here with the tree that the other researchers no longer so much as glance at him as they go by. Today, though, Kihyun doesn’t have the time to spare. He gives the trunk one last pat before continuing on toward the elevators.

The building itself had been a mall once—at least that’s what the supervisor had said, back when Kihyun first started working here. Kihyun, born four generations after the burned out shell of the world had begun trying to piece itself back together, had been too proud to admit that he had no idea what a mall was. He had waited until the other members of their newly formed research unit had left the laboratory that night before looking it up on the hulking computer.

The building suits its current role as a research center much better, Kihyun thinks. The smaller shops have been repurposed into offices and meeting rooms, dormitories and lounges, while the larger storefronts have been converted to laboratories. Many spaces still remain unused, waiting for renovation and for workers, but what has been filled is bustling with life. 

Unlike the escalators, the elevators were able to be renovated and put back into use. Kihyun’s reflection stares back at him as he steps inside and pushes the button for the third floor. He looks tired, which is nothing new. There is also dirt smeared on his cheek, which is nothing new either. He frowns and scrubs at it with the back of his hand. The dirt doesn’t budge. Kihyun stares at it for a moment longer before shrugging. No one on his team in the botany labs will notice a bit of dirt anyway.

The elevator dings and the door slides open. Kihyun readjusts the satchel and exits onto the third floor. He turns right, following the the balcony along the curve of the atrium for a while before veering off into an interior hallway. He passes a couple of offices before reaching a lab. As he steps through the laboratory doors, yet another layer of tension slides from Kihyun’s shoulders. More than any of the places he lived while growing up, or even his room in one of the dormitories down on the second floor, this place is home. 

Kihyun quickens his pace. He turns to the left, bypassing the entryway into the lab proper, and opens a door into a side room. The space was probably supposed to be a reception area, but they don’t get many visitors here. Instead, over the past two years it has morphed into a sort of lounge. A break room, as Hyunwoo calls it—or, as Minhyuk likes to affectionately say, a mess. 

There’s a beat up sofa shoved against the wall and another couch haphazardly left in the middle of the room. A large round table takes up one corner, with mismatched chairs scattered around it. The opposite corner boasts a handful of cupboards above a sink that is perpetually filled with flowers—field samples that were so pretty it would be a shame not to bring back extra. The remaining miniscule counter space is occupied by a selection of dirty mugs. 

The room currently has three occupants. Changkyun and Jooheon are sitting at the table, each holding sections of a newspaper. Neither of them so much as look up as Kihyun comes in. He rolls his eyes and approaches the couch in the middle of the room, where the third occupant is sprawled out. Though the guy keeps his eyes closed, Kihyun can tell he’s not actually asleep. 

Kihyun kicks the back of the couch and says, “Hey, asshole.”

“What, dickface?” Hyungwon replies, eyes still firmly shut. 

Across the room, Changkyun snorts. “Asshole and dickface,” he drawls. “What a perfect match.” Jooheon cackles and reaches over for a high five. 

Kihyun pointedly ignores both of them as he asks Hyungwon, “Do you know if the diagnostics are back yet on that tree Minhyuk found yesterday?” 

Hyungwon finally cracks an eye open and regards Kihyun with grudging curiosity. “I’m not sure,” he says. “I’ve been working on a different project. You’d have to ask Hyunwoo hyung. Why?” 

Instead of answering immediately, Kihyun rests his satchel gently on the arm of the couch. He opens the flap and then carefully pulls out a sample bag sitting right on the top. The tiny, pale pink flowers inside are just visible under the shitty lighting.

Hyungwon sits up so hastily he almost falls off the couch. Kihyun holds the bag out and Hyungwon takes it carefully, gaze riveted on the flowers. Kihyun grins.

“I think I found more of them.”

✿✿✿

The sliding door doesn’t so much _whoosh_ out of the way as wheeze tiredly along its tracks. Minhyuk bites back a smile. After a long day in the field, he feels much the same. His knees are creaking in protest of his afternoon spent crawling around searching for and collecting samples of moss. He wants nothing more than to get his samples stored away so he can go take a nice long shower.

There’s only one section of lights turned on in the lab, back by the main work station. Minhyuk can tell who is sitting hunched over the workbench the second he sets foot in the room. There’s no mistaking that close-cut hair paired with those broad shoulders and biceps that are obvious even through long sleeves. 

Minhyuk grins. “Honey, I’m home,” he warbles. He carefully makes his way across the lab floor, sidestepping the rolling racks stacked with plant samples. At the workbench Hyunwoo startles and turns to look over his shoulder. He squints, then realizes who it is and lets his look of confusion melt into a smile. 

“Hey,” Hyunwoo says as Minseok stops beside the bench. “Have a good day?”

“Yup.” Minhyuk grins and pats his bulging satchel, which is full to the brim with samples from all around what used to be the city’s suburbs. “Just took a bit longer than I expected. Where are the kids? Are they all in bed already?” 

Hyunwoo huffs out a laugh. “You do realize that every single member of our research team is a full-grown adult, right?” 

“They’re full-grown children,” Minhyuk shoots back, beaming. Hyunwoo shakes his head, a smile pulling at his lips, and turns back to whatever he’s got on the workbench. Minhyuk leans around him to take a look. The table is cluttered with samples, some still carefully enclosed in bags or containers while others have been removed for examination. Minhyuk’s eyes skim over the leaves and bark and soil before honing in on the little pink flowers laid out in front of Hyunwoo. Minhyuk gasps.

“Another one?” he hears himself ask, but it’s as if someone else were talking. 

Every ounce of his being is focused on the flowers. They’re the same as the ones from the tree he found yesterday, he’s sure of it. Minhyuk’s heart is pounding in his ears, much as it had when he first laid eyes on that scraggly tree yesterday. The tree had been lodged between overgrown bushes, struggling to reach the sunlight but still boasting a scattering of tiny pink blossoms.

Cherry blossoms.

Minhyuk had only ever seen them in pictures. They, like so many other things, were lost to that time _before_. Cherry blossoms were one of the plants Minhyuk always hoped to find, but realistically knew he was unlikely to ever see with his own eyes. And yet—

“Kihyun found them. Said there was a whole bunch of the trees out in sector S-220.”

“A whole bunch?” Minhyuk asks. His voice is quiet, almost reverent, in stark contrast to the urge he feels to scream, to yell, to laugh and dance around with joy.

“Yeah.”

Minhyuk, forcing himself to swallow his euphoria for a second, furrows his brow and asks, “Why didn’t we find them last year? Did we not monitor that sector last spring?” He could have sworn they had, but the field researchers spend so much time flitting from one sector to another that it’s hard to keep track.

Hyunwoo frowns and shakes his head. “No, we were out in the M sectors then.” There’s a sadness in his voice that Minhyuk understands well. There simply aren’t _enough_ of them. The botany unit can’t be everywhere at once, and for each thing they find they miss hundreds more. “But,” Hyunwoo says, the smile creeping back into his voice, “we found them now.”

“Yeah,” Minhyuk says. He can feel giddiness building up in his stomach, bubbling up through his chest and threatening to overflow. “We did.”

✿✿✿

Hoseok knows his jaw is hanging open, but he can’t help it. The trees in front of him are young and a bit scrappy, nothing like the magnificent beauties he’s seen in pictures. Despite this, they hold their own sense of dignity—they have defied all the odds, and now they’re _here_. Really and truly here, right in front of him, and Hoseok wonders if maybe he’s dreaming.

The click of a camera shutter assures him that he is very much in reality. Hoseok snaps his mouth shut and shoots Kihyun a glare. “I thought you were here to take pictures of the plants, not me.”

“I couldn’t resist.” Kihyun grins and shrugs, lowering his camera. “I had to capture that moment of raw emotion on your face.”

“Bullshit. You just wanted blackmail material.”

“That too,” Kihyun says, and then skips easily away from Hoseok’s half-hearted punch. “I can’t wait until Minhyuk gets here,” he continues as he meanders toward the trees. “His face is going to be _ridiculous_ and I’m going to document every second of it.” 

“Pictures of the _plants_ ,” Hoseok reiterates, but it falls on deaf ears. Hoseok rolls his eyes and turns away from the cherry trees. 

From the second they left the rover he’d only had eyes for the trees, but now Hoseok takes the chance to really look around. They’re in the middle of what obviously was once a neighborhood playground. A slide and a swingset are miraculously standing, although nearly overgrown with plants. The nearest apartment building is still mostly there, its dilapidated state owing to age rather than the explosions that decimated so much of the rest of the world. Down the hill, Hoseok can see the cracked roof of what was probably once a school. 

High above, the sun shines through a residual haze. Spring is beginning, and Hoseok revels in the marginal warmth from the sun’s rays. He tips his head back and closes his eyes. Kihyun’s shoes shuffle across the ancient asphalt, and a breeze rustles through cherry trees, no doubt sending some of the petals fluttering down. Hoseok could almost swear he hears children laughing in the distance.

It’s not hard to imagine this place, ten or twenty years down the line, filled once more with families. School bells ringing. Children stopping by the playground on their way home in the afternoon. The cherry trees, tall and mature, creating a canopy of blossoms above and pathway of petals below. It’s not an immediate future, but it’s not all that far, either. The cherry blossoms are only the beginning.

Hoseok breathes in, and the Earth breathes with him.


End file.
